ART ATTACK - static.theceomagazine.com · 116 117 ART ATTACK “I think being rejected at first...
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117 116 ART ATTACK “I think being rejected at first makes you work harder. We were going to show the world that we were capable.” - Craig Waddell Worldly travels have provided ample inspiration for Australian artist Craig Waddell. WORDS SKYE HOKLAS IMAGES BENJAMIN MCCLOGHRY T he works of Craig Waddell are somewhat of an oxymoron. They are chaotic yet calming; poignant yet fun. Some feature imagery of floral bouquets; others dark skulls. Some depict the beauty of heaven; others the desperation of hell. Craig’s pieces are shaped by his own life experiences— overseas travels to faraway places, volunteer aid work, and falling in love. They often reflect a story or a place brought to life through a painting, drawing, or sculpture. Craig’s interest in art began during his childhood. He says school was always a challenge for him and, due to dyslexia, he bluffed his way through most of the academic subjects, using his homework time to steal his sister’s Dolly magazines and draw inspiration from them. In his early youth, his attention shifted to sport. He was playing first-grade cricket in Sydney and travelling to England in the off-season, showing great potential to make a career out of the sport. However, marred by injury, he was forced to give that dream away. It was later that a friend’s mum suggested enrolling in the National Art School. “At this stage, I had never had anyone discuss university or any other options with me,” he recalls. “She was quite instrumental in helping me explore those things and then it all sort of flowed on from there.” Craig’s application to the National Art School was rejected at first, but somehow the stars managed to align. University enrolments were down that year so a lot of students who had already been accepted into the art school left for other institutions. This created an opportunity for Craig, and a dozen others, to enrol in a first-year art class. “I think being in that environment—and a lot of us were mature-aged students by that point—allowed for some wonderful creativity. Most of us had done a lot of travelling and other things before we decided to come to the National Art School. I think being rejected at first makes you work harder. We were going to show the world that we were capable. We were comrades and we had this special bond. I think that was really nurturing.” At the end of their time at the National Art School, many of the students from that class won scholarships for further studies. This included Craig, who received the Pat Corrigan Travelling Scholarship for painting. Fast forward to 2000 and he was back in Australia, invited to participate in a satellite show, for the 2000 Sydney Biennale, at the Casula Powerhouse. From there, things quickly fell into place and his work was picked up by a commercial gallery. “That was all great, but I felt I hadn’t really discovered my creative language yet,” he says. “So I enrolled to go and work for Australian Volunteers International and was posted to a very remote village on the border of Thailand and Cambodia for one year. Then I moved to Chiang Mai in Thailand for another year. I worked with kids with disabilities in rural schools. We would go out, do big drawing projects, and it was a way they could learn English using visual aid. In that time, I got an invitation to go to Chiang Mai University to consider being an artist in residence there, and I ended up enrolling in a masters degree.” The experience gained from volunteering had a profound effect on Craig’s artistic style, and it is still a large part of his life today. He has also taken away many things from his travels around the world. “I think that for me is really the key. People often ‘luck’ into an art style, they make their mark, and then that garners a response from an audience. Suddenly, people are noticing their work and they’re possibly even becoming commercially viable. As humans, it’s nice to know that what we do touches people and creates a response but I An artist of intuition Image by Julian Wrigley ART ATTACK As featured in The CEO Magazine For more info visit theceomagazine.com THE BRAND WAGON • JAVA IS THE NEW BALI • OFF THE GRID AT ARKABA STATION Empowering female senior executives FISHBURNERS’ MURRAY HURPS iSELECT’S SCOTT WILSON HOWABOUTEAT’S SERGEJ METELIN DNW GROUP’S DEAN WILLEMSEN Cruising in the Chrysler SRT8 Trucking Volvo Group’s driving force on track 4 8 hours in Singapore e rise and rise of RICHARD BRANSON TOTALLY TOURISM A tale of two countries
Transcript of ART ATTACK - static.theceomagazine.com · 116 117 ART ATTACK “I think being rejected at first...
117116
ART ATTACK
“I think being rejected at first makes you work harder. We were going to show the world that we were capable.”- Craig Waddell
Worldly travels have provided ample inspiration for Australian artist
Craig Waddell.
WORDS SKYE HOKLAS
IMAGES BENJAMIN MCCLOGHRY
The works of Craig Waddell are somewhat of an oxymoron. They are chaotic yet calming; poignant yet fun. Some feature imagery of f loral bouquets; others dark
skulls. Some depict the beauty of heaven; others the desperation of hell. Craig’s pieces are shaped by his own life experiences—overseas travels to faraway places, volunteer aid work, and falling in love. They often reflect a story or a place brought to life through a painting, drawing, or sculpture.
Craig’s interest in art began during his childhood. He says school was always a challenge for him and, due to dyslexia, he bluffed his way through most of the academic subjects, using his homework time to steal his sister’s Dolly magazines and draw inspiration from them. In his early youth, his attention shifted to sport. He was playing first-grade cricket in Sydney and travelling to England in the off-season, showing great potential to make a career out of the sport. However, marred by injury, he was forced to give that dream away. It was later that a friend’s mum suggested enrolling in the National Art School. “At this stage, I had never had anyone discuss university or any other options with me,” he recalls. “She was quite instrumental in helping me explore those things and then it all sort of f lowed on from there.”
Craig’s application to the National Art School was rejected at first, but somehow the stars managed to align. University enrolments were down that year so a lot of students who had already been accepted into the art school left for other institutions. This created an opportunity for Craig, and a dozen others, to enrol in a first-year art class. “I think being in that environment—and a lot of us were mature-aged students by that point—allowed for some wonderful creativity. Most of us had done a lot of travelling and other things before we decided to come to the National
Art School. I think being rejected at first makes you work harder. We were going to show the world that we were capable. We were comrades and we had this special bond. I think that was really nurturing.”
At the end of their time at the National Art School, many of the students from that class won scholarships for further studies. This included Craig, who received the Pat Corrigan Travelling Scholarship for painting.
Fast forward to 2000 and he was back in Australia, invited to participate in a satellite show, for the 2000 Sydney Biennale, at the Casula Powerhouse. From there, things quickly fell into place and his work was picked up by a commercial gallery. “That was all great, but I felt I hadn’t really discovered my creative language yet,” he says. “So I enrolled to go and work for Australian Volunteers International and was posted to a very remote village on the border of Thailand and Cambodia for one year. Then I moved to Chiang Mai in Thailand for another year. I worked with kids with disabilities in rural schools. We would go out, do big drawing projects, and it was a way they could learn English using visual aid. In that time, I got an invitation to go to Chiang Mai University to consider being an artist in residence there, and I ended up enrolling in a masters degree.”
The experience gained from volunteering had a profound effect on Craig’s artistic style, and it is still a large part of his life today. He has also taken away many things from his travels around the world. “I think that for me is really the key. People often ‘luck’ into an art style, they make their mark, and then that garners a response from an audience. Suddenly, people are noticing their work and they’re possibly even becoming commercially viable. As humans, it’s nice to know that what we do touches people and creates a response but I
An artist of intuition
Image by Julian Wrigley
ART ATTACK
As featured in The CEO MagazineFor more info visit theceomagazine.com
THE BRAND WAGON • JAVA IS THE NEW BALI • OFF THE GRID AT ARKABA STATION
Empowering female senior executives
ISSN 2201-876X
9
772201 876005
37
$19.95 incl. GST. Issue 59, July 2016
theceomagazine.com
FISHBURNERS’ MURRAY HURPS
iSELECT’S SCOTT WILSON
HOWABOUTEAT’S SERGEJ METELIN
DNW GROUP’S DEAN WILLEMSEN
Cruising in the Chrysler SRT8
TruckingVolvo Group’s driving force
ontrack48hours in
Singapore
The rise and rise of
RICHARD BRANSON
TOTALLY TOURISMA tale of two countries
118
CEO Circle
guess I’ve always used travelling as a means to get a little bit removed from that. Travelling opens me up to different ways of thinking. There’s a feeling of freedom attached to it and a feeling of being enlightened by things—culture, landscapes, and language. I tend to just embrace what the next part of the journey is and not worry so much about the actual outcome. That’s now very much ingrained in my system. With travel, you bring back all these beautiful things that you have gathered, such as textiles, ceramics, and kooky sculptures; you have those items around your studio and ultimately it all feeds back into who you are and what your work is about.
“Colour and texture is also really important to my work on an intuitive level. I think that some of the things that I’ve had trouble with in my life—like being dyslexic and maybe not understanding things as quickly as others—has become a positive. I knew that with colour, for instance. I’m colourblind so colour for me is very intuitive—I work off tone. I’ve learned to really trust that and believe that it’s a strength and not a weakness.”
Craig’s most recent exhibition was held at the Nicholas Thompson Gallery in Collingwood, Victoria, during May. Titled ‘Into the Skin’, it featured f lowers, and presented an exploration of the ways in which society uses them; for example, as an offering. “It was a celebration of life and death and the role that nature plays in that, with lots of inspiration from my time living in Thailand,” he notes.
His next show will be held at the Edwina Corlette Gallery in Brisbane, Queensland, during August. The works are based on a trip Craig took earlier this year to Mexico, and are inspired by the Aztec and Mayan antiquities he encountered at the country’s many great museums, in addition to his experiences with the country’s unique religion, and culture.
craigwaddell.com
ART ATTACK
“I’m colourblind so colour for me is very intuitive—I work off tone.” - Craig Waddell
ART ATTACK
Image by Julian Wrigley
